Twitter Pulling the Plug on Video Service Vine

Twitter is pulling the plug on its video service, although it will not do so immediately.

The app will be discontinued “in the coming months” to give Vine users adequate time to download their Vines.

“We value you, your Vines, and are going to do this the right way,” reads a Vine blog post. “You’ll be able to access and download your Vines. We’ll be keeping the website online because we think it’s important to still be able to watch all the incredible Vines that have been made. You will be notified before we make any changes to the app or website.”

Vine said it will be “working closely with creators” to ensure users’ questions are answered. The company added it will “work hard to do this the right way” and will alert users via the app when the changes begin.

The decision to shutter Vine does seem strange and rather sudden given that just a few months ago Twitter still seemed committed to the app. Back in June it announced it had increased Vine’s brief six-second limit to 140 seconds.

News of Vine’s upcoming demise follows Twitter’s announcement that it is laying off nine percent of its workforce, which translates to between 300 and 350 people.

It is no secret that Twitter is floundering. It has had little user growth in months and its shares have lost much of their value, plummeting a whopping 40 percent this year.

More recently, a number of big names originally interested in purchasing Twitter — Google, Disney, Apple and Salesforce — seem to have lost interest in the microblogging firm, which doesn’t bode well for the quick sale CEO Jack Dorsey had been hoping for.